A detailed cross-section of a very young beech tree, which is only one
hundredth of a millimetre thick, won the 1994 Nikon International Small World Competition last month.
In the terrestrial dust devils, the team found that around 60 - 70 % of all the fine dust particles (with diameters up to three
hundredths of a millimetre) appear to stay in suspension.
A beam of light is confined by total internal reflection to travel inside such an optical fibre, whose thickness may be anywhere between one
hundredth of a millimetre and a few millimetres.